


Friends Indeed

by Ladytalon



Category: Borderlands
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-19
Updated: 2015-11-19
Packaged: 2018-05-02 09:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5243960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladytalon/pseuds/Ladytalon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tina tries to get Zed a date with Tannis... by any means necessary.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friends Indeed

The trouble with being friends with a fourteen year old girl, Zed thinks to himself, is that she's fourteen years old. This isn't the first time he's wondered why they always seem to end up hanging out together, and it won't be the last. Today, she's visiting him in Sanctuary and trying to get him to play some sort of game he's never heard of. "Come onnnn, girl! Bunkers & Badasses is the bestest game EVER," Tina roars at him.

Zed shakes his head and turns back to the operating table, preparing to continue the autopsy. "I ain't got time for that kinda stuff, kid. How about them Vault Hunters you're always goin' on about? I bet they'd play it with you. Scalpel." He holds out a gloved hand and waits for Tina to drop the requested instrument into his palm.

"Gotcha, Doc." She hands it over, yanking up her surgical mask so she can lean in close to watch. "So what happened to _this_ unlucky bastard?"

He glances up at her. "Language."

"Aw, come _onnnnnn_ dawg! I gots ta express myself somehow," Tina complains.

"You can express it somewhere else if you're gonna swear; you know the rules I got in here," Zed tells her. "Anyway, goin' from the fact that this dude don't got a head... I think gettin' decapitated's probably what killed him."

"Fascinating conjecture," she says, shifting her speech patterns so that she sounds like the people in that ECHO-drama she likes so much. "Is it true, my good sir, that his internal organs shall burst like a grenade if left unattended?"

"That happens sometimes. Might not this time, but I guess it could," Zed admits. "Why, you wanna see 'em pop?"

Tina nods excitedly, so he makes the standard Y-incision and peels the skin back. "Verily, it looketh like another set of clothes, my good doctor," she says loftily, then her voice shifts back to normal. "Seriously though, shorty gon' go boom or wha-aaaat?!"

"Don't think he's been dead long enough, but it's always possible." Zed lifts a hand to move a few strands of his hair back off his forehead using his relatively clean forearm. "You never said, about the Vault Hunters."

"Oh. Well, you know how we do."

"If I knew it, I wouldn't bother askin.'"

She sighs, looking impossibly young as the toes of her mismatched shoes scuff the floor. "Everyone's too busy over those new Vaults, even Brick."

Zed pauses to look at her. "I'm sure that ain't true. It's just an excitin' time for 'em, that's all."

"Yeah, maybe..." Tina suddenly lunges over the table and gasps loudly enough to startle him, so the scalpel slices in a lot deeper than he's meant to be cutting. "Oh-emm- _Jack_ , clap your crankyass peepers on HER!"

"Darn it, kid...!" Zed yanks the scalpel loose from where he's accidentally buried it in the bone, wiping it on his smock before lifting it up to see how badly it's been damaged. "You gotta quit doin' that!" He belatedly looks around to see what she'd been trying to point out. "What was so hell-fired important that you had ta jump all over the dang place?"

Tina scoots over behind him and reaches up to plant both hands on his cheeks and turn his head in the direction he's supposed to be looking. She's so short that even by standing on her toes, her fingertips barely reach his jaw, but Zed supposes that it's the thought that counts. "Loo-oooook," she sing-songs.

All he can see is Johnny Waffles chasing Claptrap, and..."For cryin' out loud, Tina, I don't care what that woman does!"

"C'mon, girl! I know you want some of that sweet, sweet booty!"

"First off, I ain't your _girl_ and secondly, you'd better be talkin' about sand pirate treasure," Zed warns her. "I told you last time that you'd best leave off."

His small, terribly annoying friend simply dances around him gleefully. "She wants to gets allll up under your apron, my cranky compadre."

He has no idea where she's getting this from, but isn't inclined to tell her that he really wouldn't mind at all if Patricia Tannis wanted to do exactly what Tina is suggesting. "Quit callin' me cranky," is what he ends up saying, then tacks on another declaration when her smile widens. "Nobody's gettin' anybody's secret pirate treasure _or_ sneakin' under any aprons. Now, you wanna see this guy's gallbladder explode, or what."

"Exploooosions," she crows in poor imitation of infamous loudmouth Mister Torgue. 

Speaking of loudmouths... "Hey. _You_ said 'ass' before, didn'tcha?"

"I know not of what you speak," Tina says piously.

"Naw, you said 'crankyass' which has the word _ass_ in there. One more slip-up, and you owe me a bar of eridium."

"You are _mad_ cranky, though."

"If I am, then I wonder _why_ ," he says sarcastically. "That Tannis lady ain't what I'd call a good time, so just drop it. Neither of us is interested." Zed frowns down at the corpse's exposed intestines, wondering if he'd nicked anything when she had startled him - one small cut could make the other organs unusable for anything but skag bait. He doesn't _see_ anything, but he'll know for sure in an hour or so. "Hey, you wanna get some lunch? Moxxi changed the menu last week."

" _Moxxi_ ," Tina sighs dreamily.

"I'll take that as a yes." Zed sweeps his tools into the slightly rusted metal tray and takes the whole thing over to dump it in the sink. There's no clean towels, so he grabs the cleanest _looking_ one and spreads it out across the cadaver's chest before sliding the table back into the refrigerated unit and closing the door. Tina drifts over to watch him peel his gloves off and wash his hands, then forget that he still needs to remove his apron and mask so that he has to wash his hands again...small wonder he's out of clean towels, Zed thinks. He never used to care as much for being overly sanitary because all it's ever gotten him is a lot of empty soap containers that cost a mint to get refilled. Still, ever since that business with a certain communicable disease that shall remain nameless, Zed figures it's better to err on the side of caution. 

Besides, he can always extort Ned into paying for the extra supplies. What's the use of having a brother who's supposed to be dead if you can't practice some good old-fashioned blackmail on him once in a while? 

Tina washes her own hands after he glares at her pointedly, then they head out for Moxxi's place. There are a few people gathered around the one-armed bandits by the side entrance, and Sir Hammerlock is in his customary corner spot. He's no doubt thinking new ways to integrate dangerous wildlife into the Pandoran ecosystem; Zed could throttle the man for having that pair of threshers shipped from Elpis.

"Greetings, the both of you," Hammerlock says cheerfully. "Might I suggest ordering from the _old_ menu? I'm afraid the chef hasn't quite gotten the trick of the new recipes."

"'Sup, dawg?!? How's that fine-ass sistah of yours? Is she coming to visit soon? _Tell me she's comin' to visit soon,_ " Tina demands. "She fills out those shirts she's got, like, DAY-UM."

Hammerlock sighs. "I sincerely hope she will _not_ visit. I fact, I pray daily for her painful demise but that's neither here nor there... Or likely to happen anytime soon, more's the pity." He holds out his prosthetic hand to Zed with a smile. "Ah, Doctor! It is truly good to see you out and about - are you well?"

Zed takes the other mans hand in his, ignoring propriety to shove Hammerlock's sleeve up and examine the point where metal ends and flesh begins. "Oh, I'm gettin' by fine...your arm, on the other hand, don't look so good. Stop on by and I'll take a look at it, that is if you ain't too busy thinking up a scheme to ship in some more creatures who'd want to eat us for dinner."

"My dear fellow, your wit never ceases to entertain and amuse. Well-landed jokes, _ho_...!"

"It wasn't a joke," Zed murmurs to Tina as they find an unoccupied booth. "Just you look at him! Thinkin' up one of them crazy schemes right now, I'll bet."

"I wonder if she can make me some crumpets," Tina wonders aloud.

"Just get a salad; you like 'em now, right?"

"Don't tell nobody, dawg."

"Tell ya what. I'll get a salad, and you get a skag steak with whatever extra you want, and then when it comes out we'll just switch plates so nobody'll know."

They clink their water glasses together in agreement, then browse the menu as if they _haven't_ memorized it months ago. Moxxi comes over with the same seductive smile she uses on friend and foe alike - for all Zed knows, she probably even looks at the dumpster like that. "Well, well. Hey there, Sugar. Looking for something hard to swallow?"

"No dicks today, just some lunch if ya don't mind," Zed says calmly, sending Tina into immediate hysterics. "How're the crumpets?"

Moxxi sighs. "I miss your brother; you could always count on him to play along. What can I get for you two?"

Tina stops snorting long enough to request a skag steak with a side of greens and three skewers of marinated rakk meat. Zed puts in his own order of a salad, rakk ale, and a plate of bread for them both to share. "You lookin' _good_ , Moxxi-girl," Tina sighs out, and Zed watches the older woman struggle not to roll her eyes as she turns to walk away. 

"I think you're a bit younger than what she's lookin' for," Zed suggests. "Just somethin' to think about."

"I'll think about it while _you're_ thinkin' 'bout raiding some Science Pirate treasure and swabbing her deck in the _dark_ , if you know what I mean, dawg."

"If I was swabbin' anything, I'd probably do it around midday so's I could see what I was doin,'" he replies, making Tina laugh so hard that water shoots from her nose. Their food arrives and they spend a few minutes shifting everything around so that it'll be easy to swap plates if anyone decides to stop by their table and give Tina a hard time. "Hey, you see that set of twins just came in from Eden 4? Boy and girl; you could take your pick," Zed teases.

Tina narrows her eyes at him and spears some vegetables with her fork. "They're _babies_."

"They're your age."

"Not interested," she says from around a mouthful of salad.

"Guess you must like 'em old," Zed comments, keeping the smile off his face as he cuts a piece of his steak and examining it before putting it in his mouth.

Tina makes a rude gesture at him and he's lulled into a false sense of security before she leans across the table. "You know who _ellllllse_ likes super old people? Your lady Tannis."

"Lay off, will ya? I ain't _interested_."

"Girl. You are _totally_ interested! Just don't wanna show it in case _she's_ not...but that fiiine chick totally wants your staff of office, I can tell!"

"You can _not_ ," Zed splutters, because his rakk ale has just gone down the wrong pipe. "You're such a friggin' pain in the ass!"

"And you get on _me_ for swearing?!?!"

"We ain't in my clinic, and I'm older'n you," he points out. "I'm entitled to it. Now eat your dang salad before I send an ECHO all about what you're eatin' straight to the Crimson Raiders."

Tina chews another mouthful loudly. "You gon' finally admit that you want all up on her badonkadonk?"

" _You_ gonna drop it like I keep tellin' ya?"

"I swear it on Madame Von Bartlesby's grave," she says solemnly.

Zed downs the rest of his ale, knowing that she'll just keep harassing him anyway so he might as well admit it and save them both a lot of time. "Okay, fine. Yeah, I'd swab it. I mean, if she _wanted_ me to..."

The look of pure bliss on his young friend's face instantly tells him that he's probably made the biggest mistake of his life. "Ooooooooomigod," she exhales, then takes several gulps of water before shoveling the rest of her food into her mouth at high speed.

"Now, you _swore_ -"

"Madame Von Bartlesby don't got no grave, dawg." Tina belches and leaps up from her seat, evading him when he reaches out to try to catch her. Zed stares down at his plate in consternation, wondering just what sin he's committed for this type of thing to happen to him, when she comes racing back in. 

" _Tina_."

"...what?"

"You wanna explain what the heck all that was about?"

She actually bats her eyes at him. "Don't got noooo idea what you're talkin' 'bout, Doc."

He shakes his head at her and goes back to finishing his lunch, slapping her hand when Tina reaches over to steal something off his plate. "Wonder if that body's burst all over the place yet," Zed says casually, drawing a glare from Moxxi as she walks by to deliver a heaping plate of double entendre to the next booth over. "Shouldn't have, since Scooter fixed the cooling system and all, but you never know."

"Maaan, I hope it waits til we get back there so I can see it explode," Tina says.

"Tell me what you were doin' after you ran out like your tail was on fire, and I'll make sure you don't miss it." Zed raps his knuckles on the tabletop. "Spill it. _Now_."

She grins at him and holds up a blowtorch, of all things. "Just had to get some supplies, dear Doctor," Tina says loftily, using her fancy voice again. "If we pass your lady love in the street, what better way to make her swoon into your arms than if she sees you without your shirt?"

"What, you gonna set it on fire or somethin'?"

Tina uses the thumb and forefinger of each hand to create a rectangle, squinting through the 'frame' at him. "Just imagine - you're ripping your shirt off right there in front of her eyes. It's dissolving into ash, revealing your manly- wait, you ain't all fat under there or nuttin', are you?"

"I hope not," Zed says, bemused. "I ain't letting you set me on fire, kid, so just forget it." They start talking about what the Bloodshots have been up to lately and how many of them she's blown up. As usual, the conversation is littered with several weird slang terms he has no hope of deciphering so Zed just limits his reactions to a nod and a (hopefully) wise-sounding "hmm."

They're on their way back to his clinic and he's nearly forgotten her plan to render him irresistible to Patricia Tannis, when she's suddenly right there in front of them. Zed isn't quite sure _what_ to do, but this problem is solved as soon as he hears the hiss of the pressurized fuel right before it ignites. “ _Fire_!” Tina bawls.

The only thing Zed can do is to grip the collar of his shirt with both hands and rip it off as quickly as he can, stamping his boots on the burning fabric until the flames go out. “Tina! What the _hell’s_ your-”

“Dayyyyyyyyyy-um, boy!” she whistles, and Zed looks up to see just about everyone who lives in Sanctuary standing around staring right at him. Including Tannis, whose mouth is hanging open and her eyes actually look like they’re about to pop right out of her head. Under normal circumstances he might enjoy the look on her face but it’s _Tannis_ , so her expression is likely the precursor to a seizure or other nervous-system outburst. 

Everyone else is still standing there staring as if they’ve never seen a grown man without a shirt before and as he bends down to retrieve the charred mess on the pavement, he’s starting to feel a mixture of anger and embarrassment that hasn’t enveloped him since adolescence. Zed crosses his arms across his chest defensively and storms off to his clinic, which means that he has to walk right past _her_ , and he stiffens when he hears her say, “…hair. So much _hair_ …!” 

Now he really does feel as if he’s somehow stepped back in time thirty years, and it’s infuriating. Tina lets out another piercing whistle, thinking that she’s being funny, and he can hear conversations being picked up again as he heads back to work. Zed stomps into his clinic, rummaging through a few drawers before he finds another shirt. Tina bursts through the door just as he's pulling it on over his head and when Zed puts his arms through the sleeves and tries to yank it down, the damned thing stays rolled up around armpit-level. " _Damn_ it!"

"Yo, dawg, you never told me you was buff as a Vaulty," she shrieks.

Zed pulls ineffectually at the rolled up fabric, so angry with her that he doesn't even trust himself to speak. He settles for venting his ire by grunting loudly, hoping she'll get the hint to get out of his clinic before he says or does something he'll regret.

"You got, like, muscles for _days_. Science Pirate be all like, 'whuuuut!'"

He finally gets the thrice-damned shirt pulled all the way down, and refastens his surgical apron. "You better get on out of here," Zed warns her, addressing his boots while he straightens his name tag. "That was a damned nasty trick you pulled, and I ain't too happy with you right now."

Tina actually looks surprised, as if she has no clue why he'd be so upset about being publicly set ablaze. "Why you trippin,' girl? I mean, did you even _see_ the look on her face when-"

"Get out," Zed orders, flinging out an arm towards the door while she gapes at him in total disbelief.

"Zed-"

" _Get_ ," he yells.

Tina starts to stutter out an explanation that he should stay calm to listen to, but he's had enough. "I was just trying to-"

"You were tryin' to get in my business, just like always, only this time you went too far. You don't do that to someone you're meant to be friends with!"

"You look good though, so why're you so pissed?"

"Because you didn't _ask_ , Tina! Didn't those parents of yours get around to teachin' you any manners before they got..." Zed trails off because now it's _him_ who's gone too far, and Tina's eyes are starting to fill with tears. "Dang it, kid, I'm sorry."

He reaches out to her but she steps back, sniffling and looking at the ceiling. "I...I gotta go, lots to do," Tina says, in a voice suddenly gone high-pitched and shaky.

Zed tries to stop her before she leaves, but Tina slips past him so quickly, it's like trying to catch smoke. "Tina," he calls out. The clinic door slams behind her and he sighs, scrubbing his hands through his hair and feeling like he's the worst person ever to set foot on Pandora. Zed opens the door to see if he can't get her to come back but she's halfway across the square, heading straight towards Pierce Station.

He lets the door close and walks over to lean on his desk, wishing he'd just left when she came in so he wouldn't have given into the impulse to be cruel. In her own way, Tina really _had_ only been trying to help him out - and no matter how much he wishes she'd gone about it in a different way, he's the adult in this situation and should've acted that way. Going after her now will just irritate her and show that he doesn't respect her boundaries, especially since she'll probably be crying and won't want to show weakness in front of him.

It's always been hard for him to apologize to anyone, even when he knows he's in the wrong, but especially when the wronged party happens to be a hormonal mess of a teenager who is very, _very_ good at making explosives. Zed sighs again and tries to think of what he could do to make it up to her once she's had a chance to calm down. "Hang on," he says suddenly, smacking the desktop. "I got it." It's a long shot, but the city cameras might actually have been working today... He flips the clinic's neon sign off and locks up hurriedly, hoping he's in luck.

His credit balance is a bit lower by the time the job is done, but it's not as if he has anything else to use it for anyway. Plus, there's always some idiot running afoul of skags, bandits, or those damned threshers...he'll have the money back in no time. Zed reviews the end product a few times, just to make sure it's something that will definitely win Tina's forgiveness, and can't help but smile as he thinks of her reaction. After it's all packaged up and ready to go, there's nothing left to do but send it off and wait.

Zed is cleaning up the mess the corpse had made in the cold storage cubicle - it had exploded without anyone witnessing it, a complete waste of usable organs in his opinion - when he hears the clinic door open. "So what'd ya think of it?" He asks without turning around, mildly amazed that she's gotten here so quickly.

"There was rather more hair than anyone could reasonably expect," Patricia Tannis announces, startling him so that while trying to lunge to his feet he strikes his head on the edge of the door he'd left open and winds up landing on his tailbone. "However, I found myself a great deal more attracted than repelled. You may commence whatever backwoods Pandoran mating ritual is in your repertoire."

Zed rubs at the top of his head, wondering just what the hell is happening right now. "Uh. _What?_ "

"You desire to make my intimate acquaintance."

" _Huh?_ " he asks, probably sounding as erudite as a crystallisk in heat. She looks down at him, because he's still sitting right there on the floor like an idiot, and mutters a few choice comments about how intelligent he is. Zed catches the terms _ham-fisted yokel_ and _sexually attractive moron_ being tossed around. 

" _Mating_ , Doctor Blanco."

"Well, when ya put it like that, it sounds downright romantic," Zed says drily, climbing to his feet and managing to avoid embarrassing himself yet again. "I'll say this for you, woman -you sure are blunt."

Tannis shrugs. "It saves an awful lot of time. So. Sexual intercourse?"

"Uh...what about it?" He asks, playing dumb and feeling like he's not playing a damned thing. "We ain't even been on a _date_ yet."

She suggests that they schedule one, if his 'strangely charming rural ignorance' demands it, so Zed sets a time for the following week that is immediately vetoed. "Tonight," Tannis says calmly. "At the Up Over Bar in Concordia."

_Concordia?_ "Oh, now, I don't know about _that_ -"

She names a time and then waltzes out of his clinic, leaving Zed to stare after her helplessly and wonder if it's not too late to become some sort of priest. Elpis. He's supposed to go to _Elpis_. On a _date_. Zed has always prided himself upon being a son of Fyrestone - he'd been born there and had been (almost) ready to die there, which meant sticking close to hearth and home...none of that Vault business, and _certainly_ no unnecessary travel. He's never set foot off Pandora and had never planned on doing so, but now if he wants to get the chance to know Patricia Tannis any better - all the _way_ better, so to speak -Zed will have to go up to Concordia. It's been a while since he's had intimate relations with anyone, and for the most part he doesn't even miss it, but a person has occasional itches in need of scratching. Ever since Tannis showed up with her hoity-toity ways, it seems like he's broken out in the worst rash of his life.

Zed figures that the wisest course of action would be to cancel on her and just forget today ever happened. Instead, he goes to his computer terminal and pulls up all he can find on Concordia. It seems that Nina's still up there, so at least he'll get to meet her face-to-face instead of their usual ECHO correspondence. Zed downloads all the pertinent information into his personal ECHO device, then locks up so he can get going - he'll need a shower, and then he needs to figure out if he has any decent clothes, and _then_ he needs to go see about renting a room. Not that he's expecting any sort of sexual gratification but Zed figures if he's going to allow himself to be forced off his home planet, he might as well spend the night there so he has a chance to play tourist.

He's heading to Pierce Station when a wiry pair of arms wrap themselves around his neck from behind and he's almost knocked on his face. "I take it you got that thing," he wheezes, pretending to stagger beneath her weight.

Tina jumps down and flings herself into his arms as soon as he turns to her, and Zed takes the opportunity to wipe some of the grime off of her Psycho mask using his sleeve. "Can't believe you made that just for me," she mumbles into his chest. "That was beautiful, girlfriend. Beautiful."

"Yeah, well... Dang it, kid, you ever take this thing off and _wash_ it?" he asks, frowning down at the mask.

"Once a month for sure, dawg," Tina says airily. "Don't be changing the subject though! How'd you get the footage and change it so's it was all slooooow-mo? IT WAS JUST LIKE A MOVIE," she howls, excitement getting the better of her. "WAIT 'TIL I SHOW PICKLE!!!!"

Zed sighs. "That was for you _only_. You start spreadin' that around, there's no tellin' who'll show up and ask for Engorge," he says, feeling irritated at the mere thought of it because the stuff is regulated just enough so that he's obligated to conduct a thorough physical examination before he can prescribe it. Zed has enough on his plate without having to worry about people showing up for the sole purpose of being fondled. "Listen, kid, I _am_ sorry - just got a little mad, is all."

Tina scuffs her shoes against the cement walkway. "I know," she says softly.

"I guess I got more work to do when it comes to bein' old enough to know better...but there's one thing I _don't_ gotta work on anymore," he says, trying to move past any lingering awkwardness. "She came in here after you left, and called me all kinds of names. We got a date tonight."

" _Dude_...! For reals, though?"

"Real enough," he admits. "S'posed to meet Tannis in Concordia."

Tina frowns and shakes her head. "You can't call her that no more, dawg, she's your _lady_ now! You gotta be slick, give that booty a li'l nickname - us chicks love us a smooth operator, giiiirl!"

"Why can't I call her that? It's her name," Zed points out. "Callin' her _Patricia_ just seems weird."

"Nicknames, big bruhtha from anotha mutha, nick _names_. Call her sugar booty, or somethin'!"

"I ain't callin' her sugar booty. Or...what'd you call me last week? Huggabunch?"

"Hugga _butt_." Tina pauses and gives him a look. "Concordia though? You goin' to getcha some on _Concordia_? You basically get one of them sex rashes whenever you gotta go further than _Three Horns_! That's some desperation right there, girlfriend."

Zed returns the look with interest. "My goodwill's about to run out. And they're called STD's, not _sex rashes_ ; you better hope you never get one." He brushes his pants off in case she's gotten something on them like bandit blood or who knows what else. "Listen, I gotta go - if you're still wantin' to play that thing of yours, I guess I could try it sometime." 

"You really mean it, or you just want me to stop buggin' you?" she asks suspiciously, squinting at him. 

__"Both - but mostly that last one," he says, which makes her laugh. "Don't you go showin' that to everyone you see, Tina." Zed knows that the likelihood of Tina broadcasting the edited version of his wardrobe mishap is higher than Hammerlock loosing another monstrosity upon them all, but there's still a slim chance she'll respect his wishes._ _

__A _very_ slim chance. _ _

__Practically nonexistent, actually, but Zed knows that any doctor has to harbor at least _one_ tiny sliver of optimism in order to do their job. "Seriously, kid, don't show everyone."_ _

__Tina bats her eyes at him and smiles. "I promise. Have fun gettin' some!"_ _

__He's just begun the process of being digitized and sent through the Fast Travel when the thought occurs to him that he probably should've made her promise that she wouldn't let anyone _else_ show everyone, either. _ _


End file.
